but it was a pleasure to read an anthropology professor from LSE write this:

Quote:

If someone had designed a work regime perfectly suited to maintaining the power of finance capital, it’s hard to see how they could have done a better job. Real, productive workers are relentlessly squeezed and exploited. The remainder are divided between a terrorised stratum of the, universally reviled, unemployed and a larger stratum who are basically paid to do nothing, in positions designed to make them identify with the perspectives and sensibilities of the ruling class (managers, administrators, etc) – and particularly its financial avatars – but, at the same time, foster a simmering resentment against anyone whose work has clear and undeniable social value. Clearly, the system was never consciously designed. It emerged from almost a century of trial and error. But it is the only explanation for why, despite our technological capacities, we are not all working 3-4 hour days.

I’ve been arguing for some time now that the combination of new
technology and old capitalism will soon drastically worsen inequality.

It seems to me that technology will soon destroy jobs faster than it creates
them, if it hasn’t started to already. Which is a good thing! Most of the jobs
it destroys are bad, and most of the ones it creates are good. Net human
happiness should be vastly increased, not decreased, by this process —
but, unfortunately, capitalism doesn’t work that way.....

The Federal Aviation Administration investigated an incident last month involving a drone that nearly collided with a commercial airliner in U.S. airspace, but wasn’t able to identify who was flying the unmanned aircraft or what type of plane it was. (Oh really?)

The near-miss took place on March 22 outside Tallahassee, Florida. A U.S. Airways commuter flight operated by PSA Airlines traveling from Charlotte, North Carolina, was on an approach about five miles northwest of a runway at Tallahassee airport 2,300 feet above ground when it “passed an unreported and apparently remotely controlled aircraft,” according to a statement from an FAA spokesman.The commercial pilot reported the “near mid-air collision” to air traffic control and the agency investigated the incident, but “neither the UAS nor the pilot could be identified,” it stated, referring to the acronym for unmanned aerial system.

Indeed, the commercial pilot — whose identity hasn’t been disclosed — initially thought the two aircraft had collided, but an inspection of the airliner afterward found no damage, according to an article by Jack Nicas of The Wall Street Journal.

Jim Williams, who manages the unmanned-aircraft office at the FAA, disclosed the incident on May 8 during a drone conference in San Francisco and it’s believed to be the first case of a large commercial passenger jet almost striking a drone, according to the article. The news report said the pilot described the craft as “as a camouflaged F-4 fixed-wing aircraft that was quite small.” The FAA spokesman said some media reports have speculated whether the aircraft was actually a QF-4 unmanned aerial target flown by the Air Force from Tyndall Air Force Base outside Panama City. But a Defense Department spokesman told the Journal that “most military drones aren’t painted with camouflage” and the FAA spokesman said it would be highly unlikely for a military aircraft from Tyndall to find itself in the landing approach of a passenger jet at Tallahassee. Manned aircraft are required to fly at least 1,000 feet apart vertically and several miles apart laterally; and remote-controlled aircraft are supposed to be operated below 400 feet, according to the article.

The incident comes as the FAA is crafting guidelines for integrating unmanned systems into the national airspace by 2015. The spokesman said he wasn’t aware of any impacts the incident may have caused to the agency’s rule-writing efforts.

_________________"Now water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend." - Bruce Lee
"Three things cannot be long hidden: the sun, the moon, and the truth." - Buddha